Event Summary
At the Cape Cod National Seashore''s 40th birthday party in Eastham this past August, Charles "Henry" Foster, currently a fellow with the Environment and Natural Resources Program, learned that Interior Secretary Gale Norton was flying him down in February, 2002, to Washington, DC, to receive a conservation citation for his role in securing passage of the legislation that was introduced in 1959 by Massachusetts Senators Leverett Saltonstall and John F. Kennedy.
Designed to protect and preserve more than 43,000 acres of shoreline and upland landscape features on the Outer Beach of the Cape''s peninsula— an area recognized for its ecological, historical, and cultural importance— the legislation was signed into law in 1961 by Kennedy, who had moved into the White House.
Foster modestly downplays the role he played, but as the citation points out, his testimony before congressional subcommittees at pivotal points as the fate of the park system was being deliberated was key.
"A colleague described Dr. Foster as ''indefatigable'' and ''tenacious in getting information to people,''" reads the citation. "In the context of the times, this was bold and courageous work as the question of whether or not to establish the park was extremely controversial, especially among local communities."
Anyone who has been to Cape Cod knows that Foster''s work paid off— thankfully, he says, or else the area was destined to become a strip of hotels and commercial real estate. Foster continued his involvement with the park, a unit of the National Park System, serving for five years as chair of its citizens'' advisory commission, which helped manage the land. He was asked back to the post again in the early 1990s.
A version of this article originally appeared in the Kennedy School Update.